According to the World Health Organization, about one third of the world's population is infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the causative agent of Tuberculosis (TB). Stewart G R, Robertson B D, Young D B: Tuberculosis: a problem with persistence. Nat. Rev. Microbiol. 2003, 1:97-105. In 2007 there were an estimated 13.7 million chronic active cases, 9.3 million new cases, and 1.8 million deaths of TB in the worldwide. The standard treatment of TB takes a period of six to nine months and uses multiple antibiotics targeting several metabolic processes, RNA transcription and cell wall synthesis. Because of the increasing ineffectiveness against multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extremely drug resistant (XDR) Mtb strains, new targets and drugs for anti-TB treatments are in urgent demand to shorten the treatment period and combat TB infections. Clatworthy A. E.; Pierson, E.; Hung, D. T. Targeting virulence: A new paradigm for antimicrobial therapy. Nat. Chem. Biol. 2007, 3,541-548. Objects of the instant invention include developing and using compounds that selectively inhibit tyrosine phosphatases to treat diseases such as tuberculosis and other conditions that involve pathologic tyrosine phosphatase activity.